


you, my lightning in the soil

by colazitron



Category: SKAM (Norway)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Magic, Getting Together, M/M, Secret Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-25
Updated: 2019-06-25
Packaged: 2020-05-19 11:05:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,984
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19355770
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/colazitron/pseuds/colazitron
Summary: When Even meets a strange boy at his herb patch, he doesn't expect him to be Isak Valtersen, "the most powerful warlock in generations". He doesn't expect to fall in love with him either.





	you, my lightning in the soil

**Author's Note:**

> **A/N:** For anon, who asked for "secret relationship". Title from 'Sowing Lightning' in Visar Zhiti, The Condemned Apple: Selected Poetry. Also, thank you to Tina for being a doll and looking this over for me!
> 
> You may be asking yourself, "is she _ever_ going to stop writing about how love and magic are the same thing?" to which the answer is "no".
> 
> ❤

Even hums a pleased noise, head tilting to accommodate the way Isak's pulling on his hair gently. The kiss deepens, Isak's mouth wet and hot, his hand tight in Even's hair, the other one keeping his wrist pressed to the ground above him like there's any possibility of Even wanting to be anywhere but here. Isak lies on top of him almost heavily, and though Even knows it's not his full weight, he loves the feeling of it, the way it presses him down into the grass and moss under his back. He never feels more weightless than with Isak on top of him.

The brook next to them gurgles along happily, birds tweet away in the trees above. There are bugs crawling over Even's hands and legs but he's never minded very much and right now there are far better things to concentrate on. Occasionally there's a rustle in the underbrush somewhere, some animal or another darting off somewhere. A cool breeze picks up, gently brushing through their hair and over their faces, rustling the leaves of the bushes and trees that surround them.

And Isak keeps kissing him, slow and sweet, languid and deep, full of desire and promise.

There's this story Even's grandmother used to tell him, about Even's grandfather. How whenever they kissed, flowers and plants around them would bloom just a little more easily, would grow a little too quickly. Most people dismiss it as superstition, even among witches, but Even remembers sitting on his grandmother's knee and listening to the story about the long-since-wilted bunch of flowers he'd brought her once during their courtship, delayed by a day's work, and how they'd returned to full splendour when she'd kissed him in thanks. That had been their first kiss, but she claimed it never really went away.

According to Even's grandmother, it's what happens when your magic mingles with your love's, trying to give you what you most desire. For Even's grandmother and her husband, a young man she was not meant to fall in love with, promised as she had been to another, it was to be able to put down roots. To marry. Start a family.

Whenever Even kisses Isak there's wind.

  


**++**

  


There's someone at Even's clearing.

Well, it's not really Even's clearing as such. The woods here belong to the whole village, and it abuts the woods that belong to the village of warlocks not even a day's walk away.

Whoever it is is standing over Even's patch of herbs, staring down at them with their hands on their hips. Whoever they are, they have short hair which can only mean they're a warlock. Long hair and braids are a witch's sign of harmony with nature, and if there's one thing warlocks hate it's witches.

Even pushes his magic down into the earth through his feet and softens his footsteps to creep closer undetected.

They seem to be a boy. About Even's age, judging by his build. He's never actually met a warlock long enough to exchange anything but a curt greeting and he knows the days of active hostility are behind them. But he also knows the stories; the way warlocks teach their children that everything around them is a source of power for their taking. The way they use their magic to change the nature of things, to make it bend to their will. To destroy.

Even is good at plants, and potions, and making the smaller illnesses go away and the bigger ones small. In a direct confrontation he's no match for a warlock.

Still, this is witch land, and the warlock boy has no right to be here.

So Even plants his feet, asks the earth to steady him, and calls out to him.

“Hey! You! What are you doing here?”

The warlock boy whirls around, shoulders tense and his arms raising up as though he's anticipating an attack. His eyes flit over Even's body, assessing, and Even can clock the exact moment he sees the braid over Even's shoulder and makes the connection.

“Me?” the warlock boy calls back. “What are _you_ doing here? You're a witch!”

“I am. And this is witch land,” Even says, letting his voice carry in the wind.

The warlock boy scoffs and rolls his shoulders.

“No, it's not. Everything up until that line of trees over there belongs to us warlocks,” he says. “What, do they not even teach you that?”

Even bristles at the dig, the Earth underneath him growing a little brittle.

“The line is the brook. You've crossed it.”

The warlock boy looks beside himself to the little brook, the water in it still pattering along peacefully. He considers it and then Even, before turning back to glance at Even's herbs.

Even tenses.

“Are these yours?” the warlock boy asks, changing tack.

“What of it?” Even asks back.

The warlock boy looks down at the patch of herbs again, this time for longer. When he turns back to Even, he seems a little less aggressive.

“Why aren't you irrigating them?” he asks. “Then you wouldn't have to come here every day to water them or rely on the rain. That just seems dumb.”

Even bristles again. He's not sure what the warlock boy means by 'irrigation' but he surmises it's something to do with watering the herbs.

“I do just fine, thank you,” Even says and gestures at the herbs. They are, in fact, all of them thriving immensely. Even likes to think he's inherited a bit of his grandmother's touch with plants.

“You haven't even brought anything to water them,” the boy says and Even rolls his eyes.

He keeps his eyes on the warlock boy, but walks over to the brook, climbing down the small incline to it and then plunging his hand into the cold water. He calls out to it and lets it collect around his hand until he's got a sizeable bubble of it wrapped around his outstretched hand.

When he rises, he sees the warlock boy look at him with a mix of curiosity and awe for a moment or two, before he schools his face back into a passive sort of defensiveness.

Even climbs back up and walks deliberately past the warlock boy to his patch of herbs, letting the pocket of water around his hand rain down on it.

“See? Easy.”

  


**+**

  


The warlock boy is back again.

Even finds him crouched down by the brook, a hand in the water and muttering to himself, when he comes to pick some of the strawberries he'd planted earlier in the year. There's an open notebook on his knee, somehow not falling or getting wet despite how precariously it's balanced there.

As Even watches, the warlock boy pulls his hand out of the water slowly, the water running off his hand and dripping down to join with the brook again. He sighs and traces his dry finger over the pages of the book, words appearing underneath his fingertip as though by – well, magic. Then he puts his wet hand back into the water and starts murmuring to himself again.

It's a spell, Even realises. He's trying to figure out how to do what Even did with a spell. Even watches, fascinated, as the boy pulls his hand out of the water again, failing to take any of the water with it, and takes another note in his notebook. He does it twice more before Even decides to speak up.

“I can teach you,” he calls out to him.

The warlock boy whirls around, standing up so quickly that his notebook falls into the brook.

Even winces in sympathy, but when the boy hastily bends down to pick the book up it's completely dry.

“I don't need you to teach me anything,” the warlock boy snaps at him, and then turns tail and runs off.

 

**++**

 

Even sighs when Isak shifts, letting go of his hair to grab his second wrist and pin that above his head too. He can feel Isak grin against his mouth and can't help but smile back.

“Where do you think I'm going to go?” he teases, quietly murmuring the words into the small space between them.

Isak nudges Even's nose with his own, tracing it along the line of Even's cheek down to his chin and then back up over his lips to give him another kiss.

“Nowhere,” he says cheekily, squeezing Even's wrists. “I'm not letting you go anywhere without me.”

Even's smile widens a little and he strains to catch Isak's mouth in another kiss.

“Good,” he says.

 

**++**

 

The next time the warlock boy comes to Even's herb patch, Even's there first.

He doesn't actually know if or how long the warlock boy might have been watching him, too busy building little nests for ladybugs and spiders and all sorts of other insects that will take care of the lice that have somehow befallen his herbs. He can't say for sure that it's his fault, but whether it's on purpose or not, he's going to blame the warlock boy for it anyway. Even's herbs have only ever been resplendent and then the moment _he_ comes along with his aggressive sneer, they start to wilt.

Well, not on Even's watch.

Someone clears their throat behind him and when Even whirls around, there he is. The warlock boy. He's got his strange, waterproof notebook with him again, and he's standing there ramrod straight, looking down at Even like he barely thinks Even is worth his time.

Even gets up from the ground and takes a moment's satisfaction in the fact that he's taller than him.

“What do you want?” he asks. “Did you make my herbs sick?”

The boy looks genuinely confused for a moment, glancing past Even at the plants, before pulling his mask back on.

“Why would I do that? You seem to be failing on your own,” he says.

Even grinds his teeth.

The warlock boy sighs. “And to think I was going to ask you to show me that water trick again when you can't even keep a bit of parsley alive...”

Even's eyes narrow, his heart beating harder in his chest.

“I could show you a hundred times and you still wouldn't get it,” he spits.

The warlock boy frowns at him and then shrugs, smirking arrogantly.

“You don't know me. I can do anything,” he says, and before Even can say anything back to that, he turns and leaves again.

Even doesn't bother watching him go. What an arrogant ass.

 

**+**

 

“I really didn't do anything to your plants,” the warlock boy says warily, coming up to Even at his herb patch again. He comes closer this time, closer than they've been since that first time when Even walked right past him. “I wouldn't.”

Even suppresses the urge to snort a laugh – he's a _warlock_ – and squints up at him.

He's holding himself so tensely again, shoulders straight and back straighter, one of his hands clutching the notebook like it's the only thing tethering him down. But despite the defiant glint in his eyes, he doesn't look like he's lying. And Even is usually pretty good at recognising the liars.

“Okay,” he says. “I believe you.”

The warlock boy considers him for a moment, like he's trying to decide whether Even actually means it. Then, seemingly reaching his conclusion, he gives a curt nod. He doesn't leave though, so Even stays where he is, looking up at him and waiting.

The warlock boy shifts on his feet.

“Can you… can you show me that water trick again?” he asks.

Even is pretty sure he's blushing, the tips of his ears going red. There's a sneering pleasure inside him that wants to point it out, that wants to rub it in this warlock's face that there's something Even, a _witch_ , can do that he can't, but he can feel the way the thought gathers in his chest and fingertips, sticky like tar.

He nods.

“Yeah,” he says and gets up from where he'd been crouching on the ground. “Come on.”

The warlock boy marches down towards the brook without waiting for Even to lead the way, and Even bites back a comment on that too. He does, however, allow himself to roll his eyes, given that the boy's back is turned.

“I'm Isak, by the way,” the warlock boy says when Even comes to stand beside him at the water's edge.

He's already got his notebook out, finger poised like he's planning on recording every little thing. Even decides that after he's shown him this, he's going to ask about his book.

“Even,” he says.

The boy nods at him again, whether in acknowledgement or greeting Even doesn't know, but when Even turns away to kneel down beside the water, he swears he sees him mouth his name.

 

**++**

 

Isak moans quietly into the kiss, letting go of Even's wrists to put more weight onto his hands and move over Even. Even spreads his legs to make room for Isak there and they slot together with the kind of ease that only comes from practice.

Even bends one of his legs, rubs the inside of his thigh against Isak's side, just to touch. It makes Isak reach down with one of his hands, grabbing at Even's thigh and holding it there, hands squeezing at the flesh in his leg, feeling out the shape of it through the fabric, pressing them tightly together as he rocks their hips together just enough to feel electric.

The kiss loses shape for a moment when Even puts his hands in Isak's hair and tugs, but they find their rhythm again easily and Even's fingers soon card through Isak's hair more gently. It curls so sweetly over his ears, now that it's grown out a little longer, and Even winds the curls around and around his fingers, again and again.

Isak smiles into the kiss and squeezes at Even's leg once more before letting it go again, following the line of Even's body up over his side and chest to put his hand at the side of Even's neck and head, tilting his head back again to kiss him more deeply.

 

**++**

 

“No, see, you need to feel the energy in the water, you need to learn its structure. You can't shape it if you don't know what it is,” Even explains, fingers tangled with Isak's in the cold water.

Isak is frowning down at their hands, clearly trying to see what Even is seeing, but Even thinks that's the problem. Isak is trying to _see_ , and _calculate_ when there is only feeling.

Even sighs.

“I have an idea,” he says.

Isak turns to him, a wary expression on his face.

“Like the 'idea' of pushing me into the water to get me to ‘experience all of it’?” he asks, voice dry as timber.

Even grins his most beatific smile.

“Nothing like that at all,” he says, and then pulls his hand out of the water and out of Isak's, to loosen the knot in the neckerchief he's wearing. “We're going to blindfold you.”

Isak's look of instant horror is almost comical, and he leans as far away from Even as he can without actually getting up and leaving.

“Fuck no, we're not,” he says. “And who is this 'we' you speak of anyway, this is clearly all your doing.”

Even grins.

“Come on, you keep trying to put it together like some sort of puzzle, but you just need to let it happen. This is just taking those distractions away.”

“Those 'distractions' are my mind,” Isak points out. “I'm sure you have one of those too.”

Even narrows his eyes at him, and for a moment there's that hostile tension between them again, the arrogant warlock and the defensive witch. Then Isak sighs and rolls his eyes, grabbing the neckerchief from Even's hands.

“Oh, for fuck's sake, give it here,” he grumbles, and ties it around his own eyes. “But I swear to you, if you push me in again, I _am_ going to drown your plants.”

“How, if you can't move the water?” Even grins, but he doesn't push Isak again, instead gently taking his hand and putting an arm around his back to steady him.

“I'll think of something,” Isak mumbles and lets Even guide their hands back into the water.

 

**+**

 

“No, you need to say it like you mean it,” Isak says, sighing.

Even frowns at him.

“I am,” he insists.

“No, you're not,” Isak says. “You need to _name_ it. Once you've named it, you can shape it. Words hold power – don't laugh at me.”

Even grins and then laughs when Isak furrows his brow at him.

“You're such a warlock sometimes. Power this, power that… why try and amass power when you can just _ask_?”

“Because some things are incredibly stubborn,” Isak says with a deadpan stare, making Even laugh again. “Now try again.”

 

**++**

 

The rocking of Isak's hips keeps building, slowly but steadily. With it, Even's heart starts to race, starts to hammer against the cage of his ribs, and his breaths grow more shallow. There are moans interspersed here and there, both his and Isak's, but just before the build-up gets too intense, flips over into something they won't come back from without seeing it through, Isak backs off again. He slows the roll of his hips and sweetens his kisses, ducks down to press a few to Even's cheek and temple.

“Isak,” Even sighs, just to say his name and hear the happiness in his own voice. So Isak will hear it too.

“Hm?” Isak asks, letting his nose lead him back across Even's face so he can kiss him again.

“Nothing,” Even says and nudges Isak's nose with his own, going a little cross-eyed to watch the way it bends. “I'm just glad we're here.”

Isak smiles at him, those stormy grey-green eyes of him looking calm and content.

“Yeah, me too,” he says.

Even's lips are buzzing, and he's pretty sure there are ants in his hair by now. But he can feel the sun shine down on them, catching patches of his face and mostly Isak's back, the way the wind won't stop moving around them, the sound of the water, and he doesn't want to move.

Isak's kisses are slowing a little, sweet little pecks in between lingering touches becoming more and more common, but he seems as reluctant as Even to stop this yet. He still can't get enough of Isak's touch and knowing that Isak feels the same way fans the small, steady flame in his heart.

He's pretty sure so long as Isak is around that flame is never going to go out.

“I want to stay here forever,” Even says, nipping at Isak's lips to keep him close when he pulls away to look at Even as he speaks. “In this moment.”

Isak smiles down at him.

“Let's do that,” he says.

Even lifts his eyebrows, lips curling up in amusement.

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

 

**++**

 

“You're learning,” Even says with a grin, watching the furrow of concentration on Isak's brow as he cups his palms around a tiny seedling, making it shiver through just a little bit of growth.

“Shut up,” Isak snaps.

Even laughs, but shuts up. Sometimes, when he sees Isak beam as he finally works something new out – faster each time – he thinks of those first few meetings they had, of the time Isak sneered at him and said there's nothing he can't do. Watching him learn all this makes Even believe it's true, sometimes, that there's nothing Isak won't eventually learn to do. Most of the time, it's brilliant. Even's never more in awe than when Isak explains something to him about a new magical thing he's testing, some boundary he wants to push or at least explore.

Sometimes it scares him.

 

**+**

 

“Valtersen's kid is supposed to be doing the Demonstration this year, word on the street is,” Even hears his father say.

He's meant to be asleep, but he can't seem to settle down, so he'd gotten up to make himself some tea. His parents sit by the table, heavy slumps to their shoulders.

Even stops in the doorway to his room, their backs to him, and frowns to himself.

He knows Warlock Valtersen is the current Elder of Isak's village, but he's never heard anyone speak fondly of him, not even Isak. Even has never understood how a person so seemingly universally disliked can be trusted to lead anything, let alone an entire village, but he has a feeling if he were to ask Isak he'd say something about 'power' and if he asked his parents they'd say something about evil.

“Valtersen's boy? But he can't be older than Even,” his mother says, puzzled.

“Younger,” his father says. “He's not yet eighteen years old.”

A knot forms in Even's stomach, his fingers curling tightly around the wooden doorframe.

“I've heard say from Hakon that he's seen the boy do magic. He says he's never seen anything like it. The boy can do things most warlocks can't even dream of.”

Even's mother is quiet.

“Valtersen's been parading him around, proclaiming him to be the most powerful warlock in generations. If he gets in the boy's head… I daren't think about it.”

“Well, nothing's been said yet. You know how Hakon gets, always a bit overeager, that one. You'll see for yourself at the Demonstration, won't you,” his mother says, reaching out to rest a hand on his dad's shoulder.

“I'll take Even,” his dad says. “He needs to see what they can do. He needs to know.”

Even's mother hums her agreement, and Even backs away. The knot in his stomach grows tighter with every heavy step.

It can't be. It _can't_ be.

And yet, lying in his bed and staring up at the ceiling in the dark, it feels right, like things clicking into place in his head. That feeling that Isak always talks about when he explains working out a new spell.

It's Isak. It must be.

 

**++**

 

Isak sighs and slides off Even to the side, his head coming to rest on Even's shoulder. Even turns to face him, smiling at the blood-filled pink of Isak's lips. His free hand comes up to trace the contours of Isak's lips and Isak rolls his eyes at him but smiles.

“Like you look any better,” he says.

Even grins and leans in again to press just a quick, chaste peck to Isak's lips.

“I happen to think you look radiant, so thank you.”

Isak grins and shakes his head as best he can lying down like that. He rolls over so he's mostly on his stomach, half on top of Even, the hand not curled up under him coming to rest on the other side of Even's neck, toying with the braid draped over Even's shoulder there. He follows the ridges in the patterns, smooths his fingers over it.

“Do you think if we'd met… differently, we'd still be here?” Isak asks pensively, still running his fingers over Even's hair.

“How do you mean?” Even asks.

Isak keeps staring into the middle distance for a bit before he sighs and flicks his eyes up at Even.

“If you'd met me at the congregation for the first time, if I hadn't known you yet. If I'd done the Demonstration the way my father wanted… you would have thought differently of me,” Isak says.

Even contemplates it for a moment.

“Maybe,” he allows.

“Maybe there's a different life where it happened like that. Where I turn into the worst kind of warlock and you into the worst kind of witch. Where we fight each other instead of this,” Isak says.

Even frowns.

“Why does it have to be worse?” he asks.

Isak frowns at him when Even looks down at him. “What do you mean?”

“Well, why does this different life have to be worse? Why is it not one where witches and warlocks worked their differences out generations ago and we get to grow up together?”

Isak smiles.

“Yeah, okay,” he says. “If there's the one, I suppose that means there has to be the other.”

 

**++**

 

“You lied to me!” Even yells. The ground is brittle and shaky beneath him.

“I haven't lied about anything!” Isak yells back. “You never asked!”

“Oh, I never asked?! Why would I ask? 'Oh, Isak, are you, by any chance, the warlock trained to be the most powerful, vicious fighter of all to defend your kind from, oh, my kind in particular'?!”

When Even's voice cracks, so does the ground, a long rip in the earth, right through Even's patch of herbs and berries. He can see the way Isak's eyes flicks down to the damage and back up at Even, the way he's trying really hard not to pull up his defensive stance, but it only makes Even angrier. How dare Isak stand there like he hasn't used Even, like Even is overreacting, like this isn't a huge fucking deal.

“Was all of this just a game to you?” Even asks. “Were you just using me to find new ways to gain _power_?”

Isak looks stricken, and then his face darkens.

“You think I need more power?!” he shouts and thrusts a hand up into the air.

For a moment, all Even is is confused, but then he feels the hair on his arms and the back of his neck stand up, the crackle of lightning in the air.

“You think I need _more?!”_

Isak is still shouting and there's lightning collecting in his hand, so bright Even has to squint against it to be able to see Isak, the way the blue-purple glint of the lightning turns his hair almost white, the way it looks like it'd burn but be cold at the same time. It roots him to the spot, the fact that Isak can just hold it in his hand like that, can call it down from the sky, from a clear, blue sky.

For the first time, he's downright _terrified_ of Isak.

Isak laughs, the sound hollow. “Look at you. You're scared. All of you are scared. Not just witches, but the warlocks too. I don't want to be this person my father wants me to be. Sometimes I'm not sure he wants me to be a person at all.”

Even's heart beats heavily and he stares, or tries to, but the lightning in Isak's hand makes it hard to see him at all. It's like there's no light left around him, like he sucked it all out and squeezed it together into this new shape in his hand. If anyone could do that, it would probably be Isak.

And then, just as suddenly as it appeared, it vanishes.

Even feels as though someone gave him a shove, stumbling a few steps backwards. It's like the whole world snapped back into place, no bright ball of purple-white light in Isak's hand, no dark night around him. There's just Isak, with his shoulders slumped and his eyes wide.

“I just wanted to be your friend,” he says. Then he kneels and puts his hands on the ground and Even watches the fissure he caused close again, new plants sprouting to cover up the scar, like it was never there in the first place. He stumbles forward and slumps down onto his knees in front of Isak.

“I'm sorry,” he says, reaching out to put a hand right next to Isak's on the ground. “I shouldn't have...”

“I'm sorry I didn't tell you,” Isak says quietly.

Even shakes his head, inching his hand forward just the tiniest bit, until his fingers touch Isak's.

“It's okay. You don't have to,” he says and looks up from their hands at Isak, to find him looking down at them too. “It's just that your father scares me.”

Isak nods like he understands and looks up to meet Even's gaze.

“He scares me too,” he says.

Even takes Isak's hand. A gentle breeze ruffles Isak’s hair, brushes over Even’s cheeks.

 

**+**

 

“Oh my god, you're a genius,” Isak groans. He's got his head pillowed on Even's thighs, eyes closed in bliss, all his limbs relaxed and stretched away from himself. “You're going to have to teach me this once I can form coherent thought again.”

Even chuckles, hands cupped around Isak's head. He's trying not to blush, not to let his thoughts wander from the knots he's untangling in Isak's head. It takes concentration, this, but it's not usually this much of a struggle for Even to keep his focus.

It's just that Isak had looked so miserable earlier, complaining about a headache and how none of the potions back home worked on him, so Even had offered his own home remedy. He hadn't been able to explain it to Isak to Isak's satisfaction, but after swearing up and down that there's no way Even could permanently rearrange anything important in Isak's head this way, he'd lied down and put his head on Even's legs.

And now they're here. All of Isak's tension drained away, leaving only a languidly sprawled out boy who keeps groaning every other moment when Even gets into a particularly tight tangle in his head, like Even's giving him the world's best back massage instead. Even would know what those feel like, because he doubts there's anybody as clever with their hands as Mutasim.

It's just… difficult for Even, not to hear those sounds and think anything of them. Today, in the early summer sunshine with Isak sprawled out so invitingly. His legs are so strong, even in relaxation like this. He can see the faintest hint of the lines of his stomach through the thin, white shirt Isak is wearing. It doesn't exactly help that Isak's undone all the lacing and it's gaping wide open over his smooth chest either.

Even wants to touch. Wants to actually give him a massage. Wants permission to put his hands all over his skin. Instead, he pulls his thoughts back in, focuses on the knotted feeling of the inside of Isak's head and plucks at each and every one of them, gently, until they untangle.

When he's done, Isak sighs like he's never felt better in his life. Judging by the amount of knots Even has just worked through, he wouldn't be surprised if Isak's been having constant headaches for at least a few months.

Isak's eyes open, and their green-grey storms look like deep, unfathomable pools.

“If there is ever anything I can give you, name it,” he says, eyes wide and overwhelmed, like he'd forgotten what it's like not to be in pain.

Even stares down at him, upside down, at his eyes, at his lips.

“A kiss,” he says and blushes bright red, clamping his mouth shut immediately.

Fuck.

Isak's eyes go even wider.

Even can see him swallow hard, his throat bobbing with it. Isak's eyes roam over Even's face, and Even balls his hands to fists at his sides, resisting the urge to look away. Then, with more speed than the relaxed sprawl of his limbs would have suggested, Isak spins around and gets onto his knees, staring at Even on eye level. He's not moving closer, but he's not moving away either.

Even looks down at Isak's mouth and when he looks back up at Isak's eyes, Isak is licking his lips, staring at Even's mouth.

Okay, that. Okay.

Even counts down inside his head.

 _Three, two, one –_ then he kisses Isak. And Isak kisses him back.

A wind picks up.

 

**++**

 

They lie together in silence for a while, listening to the sounds of nature around them and the sounds of their friends further off in the distance. Some kids are laughing and Even can make out Jonas' loud cackle. He grins to himself before casting his eyes back down at Isak.

“How's your mum doing?” he asks, fingers digging into Isak's hair to pet at his scalp.

Isak sighs heavily.

“A little better, I think,” he says. “She's still withdrawn, but she has visitors more often now. She actually went to the market the other day with Amalie from next door.”

Even smiles and ducks down to press a kiss to Isak's forehead.

“That's good. That's really good.”

Isak nods and snuggles a little closer. Even lets the silence settle for a little before he asks his next question.

“And your father? Have you heard from him?”

Isak goes tense in his arms, and Even almost wishes he hadn't asked.

“No,” Isak says, curtly. “He's not coming back.”

“That's good too, right?” Even says.

Isak sighs heavily.

“Yeah. That's good too,” he says and then, after a brief silence, adds, “I just feel so bad that I didn't realise it all sooner.”

“Hey, no,” Even says and shakes Isak's shoulder a little. “You're not at fault here. At all. How could you have realised, when that was all you ever knew of her?”

“Yeah,” Isak says quietly, but his eyes remain downcast.

“Without you, she'd still be in a lot more pain,” Even says. “And she's strong, like you. She'll learn to live with this too.”

Isak nods a little and then tilts his chin up, asking for another kiss that Even grants easily.

“I wish I could make it all go away,” Isak says, snuggling back down into Even's shoulder.

Even runs his hand over his hair and presses another kiss to his forehead, his cheek, the tip of his nose.

“I know.”

“How are your parents doing?” Isak asks after a few long minutes of silence. “Are they still angry at you for leaving?”

Even sighs and blinks his eyes back open. He'd dozed off a little. The breeze has settled with them and so the late summer warmth had lulled him into a comfortable drowsiness.

“I think they're at least starting to get used to the idea that I'm really not coming back,” he says. “Once they accept that, they're going to have to start accepting _why_.”

Isak sighs. “Parents.”

Even snorts a laugh and then sighs too.

“Yeah,” he agrees. “Parents.”

 

**++**

 

“Where are you sneaking off to all hours of the day, hm?” Mum asks, a teasing smile on her face.

Even blushes, bundling the bread and cheese up quickly. He knows that tone in his mother's voice.

“Nowhere,” he says, because he can't exactly tell her that he's sneaking off to see Isak Valtersen, Warlock Prodigy Extraordinaire.

She's a good person, his mother. Kind and patient. She's never been anything but loving to Even. Strict, at times, but for his own good. Had you asked him a few months ago, he would have sworn up and down that she was open-minded too. That she is willing to hear anyone out, always ready to consider both sides of a story before coming to a conclusion.

Now he's heard her talk to his father on more than a few nights, and there's a sinking realisation in his stomach that 'everyone' only extends to 'every witch'.

“Alright,” she says with a slight laugh. “Keep your secrets for now. You know everything will always come out sooner or later.”

Even forces down a sigh and smiles at her instead. He does know. That's what has him worried. But so long as Isak keeps kissing him, keeps smiling at him with those open eyes like he thinks everything Even says is so interesting, when Isak himself is the most interesting, brightest person Even has ever met, he doesn't think he can stay away.

 

**+**

 

“Even,” Isak gasps, stumbling across the brook in clumsy, splashing steps.

Even kneels up from where he'd been bent over his strawberries, checking them for any lice.

“It was my father,” Isak says, eyes wide and terrified, hands stretched out in front of him like he's trying to grasp onto something invisible.

“What happened?” Even asks, stumbling up and a few steps towards Isak before Isak collapses into his arms, making them both stumble and fall back to the ground.

“My father, he's the one who did this to my mum,” Isak says. His hands are tight on Even's forearms, holding on for dear life. “He took-- he _took_ her, made her _forget_ \--”

“Took her?” Even asks. “Forget what?”

“Who she is! _What_ she is! Even, my mother is a witch!”

Even freezes. The sky reflects in Isak's eyes and Even feels the wind pick up.

Isak's mother has been frail and confused all of Isak's life. Isak's dad has told him it was the result of a difficult birth, that sometimes the body can't withstand all the pain and so the mind fractures a little bit along with it. That's why sometimes Marianne forgets where she is, what she was doing just a moment ago. Why she can barely do any magic, and doesn't remember much of her life before she came to live with Isak's father.

They met when he was travelling as a young man and came back together, a happily married couple. Then came Isak, and Marianne started getting weaker.

“She's been having headaches recently, so I did that thing for her that you showed me, right? With the knots?” Isak goes on.

Even nods at him to continue.

“I untangled a few but then I found this really, like, _really_ big one. It took me a while to get through it, but when I did, I could feel it there. My father's magic. He's done magic. In her head. I'm sure of it,” Isak says.

“Okay. But why does that mean your mother's a witch?” Even asks.

Isak takes a shaky breath.

“This morning, she was singing. It was that song you sang to the birds a few weeks ago, remember? When you wanted to show me that you could get them to join you?”

Even feels the tips of his ears go hot at the reminder. He's never been the best singer and, needless to say, the birds did not deign to join him in his song.

“My mum's always had a really lovely singing voice, and I swear to god our entire kitchen window sill was full of tweeting birds in less than a minute. And she wasn't even confused about it or frightened, she just… sang with them,” Isak goes on. “Then she told me about how her mother taught her that song when she was a little girl. She's never told me anything about her childhood before.”

“Wow,” Even says.

“I told you!” Isak insists. “The first time you did it, I _told you_ that if you can untangle knots in my head then you should be able to tie them too. I think that's what he did to her.”

Isak's grip on Even's arms is still tight, but Even winds his hands out of it and puts his hands on Isak's head.

“Okay,” he says and leans their foreheads together, running his hands through Isak's hair. “Okay, we'll figure this out.”

“Promise?” Isak asks, quietly. He's slumping forward against Even and Even presses a kiss to his forehead and then pulls him into a hug.

“Promise.”

 

**++**

 

“Hey, you lazy buggers! Are you going to come help or what?” Jonas says.

Even lifts a hand to shield his eyes from the sun and looks up at him, standing there with his hands on his hips. Isak groans and does the opposite, buries his face further into Even's shoulder.

“Haven't we done enough?” Isak complains.

Even grins and runs a hand through his hair.

“Come on,” he says, and slips out from under Isak.

Isak grumbles but gets up too, accepting the hand Jonas holds out to pull him up the side of the embankment.

“Honestly,” Isak says. “Do we have to be around for everything?”

“Uh, yeah,” Jonas says with a shit-eating grin. “That's why you're Elders.”

 

**++**

 

“I found another memory,” Isak says quietly. “It was of my grandmother again. He took so many memories of her mother.”

Even hums encouragingly, pulling Isak a little closer where they're lying tangled up on the ground.

“She sounds awesome,” he says.

He can feel Isak nod against his chest and tilts his head down to smile at him.

“You might still meet her one day,” Even says, trying for cheerful.

Isak doesn't quite manage a smile.

“I think she passed away. This one was of her getting sick,” he says.

“Oh.”

Isak sighs. “I never even knew her, but mum's been talking about her so much recently I felt like I almost did.”

Even presses a kiss to Isak's forehead. “I'm sure she would have loved you.”

Isak sighs again and snuggles a little closer, pushing his face up into Even's. Even obliges and kisses him.

Some wounds you can only soothe, he knows that. He still wishes he could take every pain Isak has ever felt and wipe it away.

 

**+**

 

“I think my dad's catching on that something is different about mum,” Isak says, pacing up and down. “So this has to work.”

“It'll work,” Even says, more confidently than he feels. There's absolutely no way they can know if this works. They've never been able to test it together. It's only been Isak pulling on the loose strings in his mother's mind to find the knots his father put there. They don't technically _know_ if their combined magics will make the process easier or harder. They've been practising working their magics together so much they're practically seamless, but that was water and herbs and trees, and this is Isak's mother.

“Yeah. Yeah, you're right. It'll work,” Isak says.

“If anyone can do it, it's you,” Even says, reaching out to grab Isak's hands and stop him from pacing. This, at least, he believes full-heartedly. “Don't worry too much. Try not to exhaust yourself.”

Isak stops his pacing, but he's practically vibrating on the spot.

“What if it doesn't work?” he asks, though they both know what happens if it doesn't work.

“It'll work,” Even repeats, pulling Isak into a tight hug.

Isak sighs, and Even can practically feel the tension leave his limbs, melting into Even's embrace.

“You're the best thing that's ever happened to me, you know?” Isak mumbles into Even's shoulder.

Even feels his heart swell and pull tight, bursting with adoration for this bright, brilliant boy in his arms.

“You too,” he says. “I've never felt like this about anyone. Ever. Not even about magic.”

Isak looks up at him, eyes calm, and shakes his head.

“Neither have I,” he says.

They sway forward together, meet in the middle with a hot touch of lips.

Wind whips at their hair and clothes, rustling the leaves on the trees, the bushes, the grass.

 

**++**

 

By the time the sun sinks close to the horizon, Even's back and feet hurt so much he doesn't want to keep standing upright for a single minute longer. On the upside, they managed to build two entire cabins today, but on the downside, Even feels like he needs to sleep for a week. He doesn't even want to imagine how Isak's feeling.

With a nod at Jonas and Mikael, he drags himself back towards their own cabin, back towards the spot by the brook where they first met. Isak's already there when he shuffles through the door, sprawled out in his chair, limbs visibly heavy.

“'Build a village', they said. 'It'll be fun', they said,” Isak groans when Even walks in.

Despite himself, Even huffs a brief laugh.

“I think 'they' were 'us', baby,” he points out.

Isak groans again, wordlessly.

“We are idiots. And liars.”

Even sinks into his own chair, just close enough to Isak's that he only has to reach out the tiniest bit to link their fingers together. A gentle breeze sweeps his hair off his forehead, cooling the heated skin there.

Isak groans for a third time, but this time it's with pleased relief.

“It'll be good,” Even says.

Isak sighs.

“Yeah. It'll be good.”

 

**++**

 

Then tension in the room is unbearable. Even keeps having to take deep breaths and tell himself to unclench his jaw, to let his shoulders fall down from where they hunch up to his ears. He's pretty sure everyone else in the room feels the same way.

Elder Valtersen's talk had been full of niceties thinly covering the threats behind them, and now that Isak's taken to the stage, it's not gotten any better. Isak’s mother sits beside his father in the ranks, her eyes wide as she watches her son perform feats of magic that has everyone in the room uncomfortable except for his father. He watches gleefully, his eyes searching the audience for those who seem the most afraid of the power he's having his son demonstrate before the whole congregation.

The intent is clear. No warlock or witch may be able to make all the congregation's decisions alone, but if Isak wanted – if his father told him to – he could do unspeakable things to all of them.

Even watches anxiously, trying to find the light he usually sees in Isak's eyes when he shows off his feats of magic, when he explains to Even what it is he's trying to do, be it coaxing lightning into a hand full of sand to turn it into glass, or enchanting a bell to ring on its own. Isak never wants to hurt anyone. It's not his fault that he _could_. They all could, given the right tools.

There is no applause when Isak dispells the lightning from his hand.

Isak's father lets the quiet ring in the room for a moment, clearly enjoying the moment after the show of strength his son just put on. He makes as if to stand up from his chair, but Isak holds his hand out to his mother, an inviting smile on his face.

“For the last part, I'm going to need a little help,” he announces. His voice rings loud and clear through the quiet room. “Mum?”

Even's heart bangs like a drum. He swallows as he watches Marianne smile back at Isak, a little confused, but take his hand and let him lead her into the middle of the room.

Then he turns to Even. Their eyes meet, catch, hold.

“Even?” Isak asks.

Every single person in the room turns to look at him. Even isn't really anyone here. He's just someone's son. But now Isak has spoken his name, has pulled away one of the sheets they'd been hiding under all this time. Isak knows his name, knows _him._

There's a murmur going through the ranks.

“What is this?” Elder Valtersen demands.

Even gets up from his chair.

“Even?” his father asks, perplexed, like he's been assuming there must be another Even that Isak is talking to. “What are you doing? Sit back down right now.”

Even looks down at his father with a shaky smile and then makes his way over to Isak.

The murmuring gets louder.

“Please sit, mother,” Isak says, and her chair zooms over from where it stood empty next to his father.

She sits, looking puzzled.

“Darling? What are you doing?” she asks, though she doesn't seem worried, even as Even comes to stand at Isak's side. If anything, she looks curious.

“We're going to make your headaches go away for good,” Isak says and leans down to kiss her head.

Isak's father roars in protest, but appears rooted to the spot. Even doesn't bother figuring out if it's Isak's doing, or someone else's.

“That would be nice,” Marianne says.

Isak takes a breath and turns to Even, holding out his hand again.

“Are we doing this?” he asks, quietly this time. Just for the two of them.

Even takes his hand. “We're doing this.”

The wind picks up.

  


**The End**

 


End file.
